The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) deadline for the first six months of 2018 data is July 19.

To prepare for the CDI post-baseline data analysis, the first CMS project review will occur in late July. Therefore, June data will need to be entered as early in July as possible to show complete up-to-date data for this measurement.

﻿Be sure to review the "Alerts" tab in the NHSN and complete missing and/or incomplete data for previous months for your facility to receive credit for data submission.

All CDC Cohort members must complete an electronic Re-consent and Agreement to Participate form to replace the previously submitted paper version uploaded at the beginning of this project. The Re-consent and Agreement to Participate is now available via your NHSN LTCF Component home page, above the Alerts tab and takes no more than one minute to complete.

Either the NHSN primary contact for the facility or the assigned NHSN facility administrator will need to log into NHSN and accept the new Agreement to Participate and Consent (or re-consent).

If a nursing home fails to re-consent, its NHSN functionality will be suspended until the consent form is accepted.

All NHSN users with a SAMS grid card, be sure to access your account at least every 60 days to update your password.

If a NHSN user does not access SAMS in a 12-month period from their last successful login, their SAMS account will be terminated and the user will not be able to access NHSN applications via SAMS until they re-register for SAMS.

After their re-registration process has been completed, they will have access to NHSN again via SAMS. They’ll remain active users in NHSN as long as they successfully login during a 12-month period or until their Facility Administrator deactivates them.

Since NHSN users will be prompted to change their password every 60 days, all users should be reminded to at least set a reminder to login every 60 days to at least change their password.

On the navigation menu to the left of the screen, click "Users," and then click "Find.”

On the Find User screen, click the "Find” button. (search criteria are not required).

Select the checkbox next to the name of the user to be deactivated and click “Deactivate.”

Once deactivated, a confirmation message will display in the upper left corner of the screen.

Click the “Save” button to assign the selected rights to the user.

KEEP IN MIND: After deactivating user, their name and information will remain on the user list; however, their "Active" status (far right column) will change from 'Y' (Yes) to 'N' (No).

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will be hosting the NHSN 2018 LTCF Annual Training which is scheduled to take place July 16-18, 2018.The training will be held on the CDC campus in Atlanta, Georgia and will include a variety of topics including antibiotic stewardship, hands on data analysis, surveillance and prevention for urinary tract infections, C. difficile, multi-drug resistant organisms (MDROs), and more.

Keep a look out for a registration e-mail from NHSN, which will launch in the next few months. While there is no registration fee, participants will be responsible for all travel expenses to include transportation, lodging, and the cost of food and beverages. Capacity for the training is approximately 300 participants, and invitations to attend in-person will be issued based on a randomized lottery system.

For those unable to attend in-person, all presentations during the 3 days of the training will be available via live web-stream. Please email NHSNtrain@cdc.gov with

﻿training-related questions.

Missed a Webinar? Recorded Webinars are Available!

Webinar materials and the recorded webinars are available on the HSAG website!

This website is an introduction to a set of training sessions aimed to provide nursing home leaders with training materials that can be used to enhance the understanding of important concepts and practices that promote stewardship and
C. difficile prevention, and provide information, tools, and resources.

This material was prepared by Health Services Advisory Group, the Medicare Quality Improvement Organization for Florida, under contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The contents presented do not necessarily reflect CMS policy. Publication No. FL-11SOW-C.2-05292018-01